


was sort of hoping you'd stay

by pvwork



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Death, Dreams, F/M, Family, POV Second Person, Post-Movie(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-27
Updated: 2014-01-27
Packaged: 2018-01-10 05:35:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1155719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pvwork/pseuds/pvwork
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's easy to forget who you are in the Drift. Mako dreams of Yancy. It's all so real some nights.</p>
            </blockquote>





	was sort of hoping you'd stay

It's easy to forget who you are in the Drift. 

You've heard people talk about the same problems you are now facing day in and day out. You remember when Stacker used to see something that reminded him of Tamsin and how he would just. Stop. 

Like he couldn't remember if he loved it first, or if she loved it first, or if they both loved it and it deepened the Drift, made their neural handshake stronger. And it broke your heart. Broke it apart because you were sad for him, that he could not find the pieces of himself that were once uniquely his because who he had become was so wrapped up in who she was. 

Integral pieces of yourself lost to the Drift. 

And he was afraid of that. For you. 

But you, you were so sure that your intentions were strong and pure enough that you would never lose yourself. It was not arrogance. It was a confidence that your sense of self was strong. You never had a reason to doubt yourself. 

Chuck was never a very creative fighter. But when he begins to grip the hanbo differently, begins to fight less like the Academy assembled soldier he is, you chalked it up to his complacency, to his attitude. You saw the evidence before your very eyes. 

But you were so sure. 

 

 

You are laying out on your roof. The cool Alaskan air is nipping at your quickly numbing cheeks and your breath blooms in front of your eyes, momentarily obscuring the swath of stars stretched across the sky, familiar and alien all at once. 

'What's for breakfast?' Raleigh asks from your left. 

'Honeyed ham, smoked sausages, maybe some bananas chips in oatmeal, and we're going to have cereal with soy milk because it's better than cow milk, and waffles smothered in butter and pineapple rings we'll cut up into faces.'

'That's nice.' 

You know in the empty, yawning pit of your stomach that the Becket siblings will be eating a handful of dry Cheerios each for breakfast tomorrow. 

"What'll we have for lunch?" You ask. 

 

 

In the morning, Raleigh is standing outside your (his?) room and he is smiling at you. This is not the Raleigh of your dreams. His jaw is more solid and his eyes are tired but he is smiling the same smile and eagerly taking your hand and chattering at you about his dreams of a tropical vacation now that everything is. Settling. 

You pass Chuck's room and you stare at Max laying across the threshold with his head dropped forlornly across his paws as he slobbers over his leash waiting for a walkies with his boy. 

'Hey, Max,' you say, 'let's go get some food.'

And he reluctantly trails behind you two as you head towards the mess hall. 

Raleigh keeps talking and you feel a rush of fondness for him that seems to choke you, holding you under waves of emotion that are warm and thoughtful and loving as you listen to him talk because he is your partner now and, possibly, forever. He is yours to call your own and all you want to do this morning is get close enough to make a home next to his heart, curl up tight so that the two of you will never be apart.

 

 

You are not a morning person. And, yet, there is the memory of waking up every morning at six to do the katas _Sensei_ said would lay the foundations for fighting in the Kwoon.

You are groggily throwing out your hand to stop one of Raleigh's limbs from connecting with your side as he excited flails at you about the simulator run that is sure to happen this afternoon. 

The numbers don't lie and you two are as drift compatible as two soon-to-be graduates from the Academy can be. 

He's laughing and you are half-asleep but you smile and murmur something positive because this is a big day for the two of you and you're excited too, beyond belief believe you me, but you don't really want to celebrate at ass o'clock in the morning. 

'Party all day, party all night!' Raleigh sings at the top of his lungs as he scurries around the room throwing clothes at you because you gotta get dressed and see the sunrise and this day is going to be perfect, Yance, perfect. You've got a pretty guess at what's on the kid's mind Drift or no Drift, so you get up and try to fend off his nerves right alongside him. Soon you'll be in his head and able to tell him brain to brain that he's been nervous for nothing. 

Everything is going to be fine.

 

 

Shuffling across the mat, staring Raleigh down as he dances just out of the reach of the hanbo in your hand, you stumble because suddenly you are caught up in a sense of déjà vu, remembering the exact same slant of light striking Raleigh's features and the memory of a blow hitting your legs that causes a phantom pain.

'Hey, hey, are you alright?'

The words at the tip of your tongue are, 'No, kid, do I look alright?'

Instead you say, 'I am fine. I did not have lunch yet.'

Raleigh gives you a sympathetic look and takes both hanbo back to the storage racks.

'Herc's been working you too hard.' 

'He needs my expertise.' 

And Raleigh looks at you with both pride and worry in his expression. You take his hand in one of yours and place your free hand on his cheek. 

'Do not worry. I will be fine. I was just hungry.' 

And you wonder how much of his mind is still strung up in yours because he nods but looks like he does not believe you. You allow him to put a comforting hand on your back between your shoulder blades and steer you towards the mess hall. You allow yourself to enjoy the warmth of his hand through the cloth of your shirt and you blink when you remember the time when it was your hand on his shoulder guiding him out of the school yards towards home. 

 

 

It's your last supper. You don't know that for sure. But you do know it for a fact. You know it because you checked your phone and the screen said February 28, 2020 and you thought, hey, leap year. You eat alone.

Raleigh is busy preparing to do rock-star-Jaeger-pilot things that the young and famous manage and you will be joining him in a minute to watch over him and prevent him from doing anything especially foolish once you scarf down this club sandwich your brother so thoughtfully left for you on your dresser. 

'Gotta prep for the big night!' said the note he left next to it. 

He wants to get drunk and pick up a Jaeger fly. You are going to cut him off after two shots and force him to stay hydrated and if he's good maybe let him make out with an enthusiastic fan before bringing him back to base early. There's a kaiju scheduled to attack soon. Unfortunately, this coincides with the time people decide to party like it's the end of the world. But you don't want to lose your edge before game night, and you're going to watch over the kid to make sure that he doesn't either.

You're a good big brother like that.

 

When you wake, you know that he had been dreaming the same dream. The residue from that last night resonating in the morning of their last time together in the Drift is heavy, sticky and clings to the walls of his (your?) mind. 

Yancy's exasperated resignation, his wry amusement, his bottomless well of love and affection for his little brother who was getting to live the life after all the _loss_ and time spent _wanting_. 

You knock of his (your?) door and he opens it to look at you, blue eyes surprisingly clear. He looks apologetic, broad shoulders collapsing under the weight of loss and regret. 

'I'm sorry.'

'It is okay. We are okay.' 

You take his hands and you let him lead you into his room. You have been in his room before, you have seen his photographs ranging from campy to splendid and now you touch them because you remember watching him take those photos, you touch them because you remember thinking: he keeps these even though they cause him pain. In these pictures he was not unhappy, because he is with his family. 

And now he is yours. You are his. 

You squeeze his hands and let him lean his forehead against yours. You lean forward and press your lips to his. It's easy. 

Raleigh apologizes again and you wonder about how real love is, how it is not just an emotion but a physical response to a person, a place, a time. The chemicals rushing through the synapses in your brain and delicately touching down on the ends of neurons are reminding you that the Drift is more than science. 

That the Drift is so, so real. 

'Mako, Mako, don't ever leave.'

'I will stay, so long as you are always by my side. We are very dangerous together, did you not know?' 

'Yes. Yes. Too dangerous to be apart.'

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Arctic Monkey's "If I Wanna Know".


End file.
